


Organic and Synthetic

by Madness_of_Xara



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Mentions of Blood, geth eye, leads up into mass effect 1, lizard cat boi, new alien species
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-09-17
Packaged: 2019-07-13 09:06:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16014746
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Madness_of_Xara/pseuds/Madness_of_Xara





	Organic and Synthetic

Being an outcast is never an easy thing, especially when you have nobody to depend on but yourself. For the longest time, Iekbon Shakur had never known the feeling of true companionship. He trusted very few people, and the people he _did_ trust, he was still wary of. He very rarely spoke of himself, and when he did, he usually kept it short and to the point. If anyone questioned his Geth eye, he would immediately change the subject. It made several people on the Citadel wary, his being a completely different and new species, not to mention his eye and mannerisms. He was usually cold, strict... much like a Turian, but with a bit more of a stick up his butt.

The only thing that had ever brought passion to the male was anything mechanical, technological. It was something he could... tinker and play with, learn and expand on, no matter what. It was a field of endless possibilities, that was for certain. It had spawned from his desire to learn and understand his strange eye, the one that had latched so desperately to his brain and managed to improve him, to make him more... sentient, than he already had been. He had been from a pre-flight species, one that had a language of various hisses and growls and a history that was only just beginning, a culture so fresh, so young...

For years, Iekbon questioned himself, wondering if his own intelligence was a gift or a curse.

After much speculation on his part, Iekbon knew the answer was easier to find than anticipated. For him, it was a blessing, but if he reproduced with his own species, it would definitely not be good, not for the stability of his planet. So, what could he do?

Forget the idea of reproduction and hope that maybe some Asari would be interested in having a daughter with him.

Of course, he wasn't much of an optimistic person.

Not with how he looked, not his personality.

Hmph. Maybe his smarts, though.

Back when he initially arrived on the Citadel, it had not been a pretty sight. He had escaped his captors, namely the Quarians who had forced the Geth eye into his skull in an attempt to see if it would fuse with him for some reason – obviously, it had, but the premise for why they tried in the first place had been quite the mystery to him, hid himself away on a ship, bleeding his oily black blood and shaking as knowledge flooded his mind from the Geth hive mind, giving him the biggest damn headache for over a week, and escaping the ship once it docked on the Citadel. He had been an absolute mess for a while, hiding and keeping himself safe for as long as he could. Of course, when he thought it was finally safe to come out, people started to call C-Sec on him. A lot.

To the point that C-Sec got sick of it and just held him, tempted to lock him up until they could figure out what they could do with him. Of course, since he had started to just go with them willingly after the third or fourth time and just sat there patiently until they released him, they decided against it.

“Okay, this is getting ridiculous,” one of the officers stated as he arrived at the scene of a call from a shop keeper. “You guys keep calling us in to grab this kid when he isn’t even doing anything except sit there.”

“We’ve been telling him to go away-.”

“ _He can’t understand you, you idiots_ ,” another officer bit off, glaring at them as his partner knelt in front of Iekbon. He offered his hand.

“You’re coming with me. Again,” the male sighed.

Iekbon took his hand and stood, his eye tired and almost defeated. The officer that held his hand frowned deeply before looking to his partner. “Would it be wrong of me to say I want to adopt this kid?”

“Garrus, what the Hell-?” his partner started, but Garrus stopped him.

“Listen. He clearly doesn’t have anyone. And every time we let him free, someone almost immediately calls us about him, demanding that we come get him. It’s getting ridiculous and he deserves better than this. Besides, I bet if we trained him right, he could make for a great addition to the force, don’t you?”

“You know how crazy you sound right now, right? He’s an unknown species, doesn’t speak any known language, has a _Geth_ eye imbedded into his skull… He could be like a Krogan but worse!”

“I’m not like a Krogan,” Iekbon had muttered, startling the Hell out of both of the men.

“You can understand us?!” the human officer had exclaimed.

Iekbon tapped the Geth eye a bit. “Like you said. It’s imbedded into my head.” _Could you get any more cryptic_? The answer to that was yes, but it seemed to get the message across one way or another.

Garrus looked at the small male in shock before his mandibles fluttered, immediately looking to his human partner with amusement. “You were _saying_ , Jerry?”

It had been a bit of a hassle getting Iekbon officially registered on the Citadel after that. He had proven himself capable of understanding each language they threw at him – well, most of them. Too be fair, not a lot of humans spoke French, Chinese, Danish, Swedish, the works. He knew the base languages for the main species, which was all that really mattered. Whatever he didn’t understand, he would get a chip for, they assured him. He gave them whatever information that he was able to give, including species name - Eekotarian, the description of his sun (which led to them later finding the name of his planet, that being Nova-14V, a small planet that they had thought incapable of hosting life, but they had been clearly wrong), and the general age that he was, which had been about fourteen human years. He had been checked out by numerous Asari doctors, all of which had been surprised at the finding of such a unique patient. They had drawn blood, taken many samples, and examined him in great detail.

A lot of people still didn’t like his being on the Citadel, but really, they couldn’t say anything anymore since C-Sec made it very clear that he was a resident and that he was a law abiding one at that. They would have to shut up and deal with it, essentially. They kept him beyond arms’ length. Only the Hanar shopkeeper didn’t seem to mind him too much. He was just another customer, really.

That had been the most uncomfortable year of his life outside of his home life.

That being spent getting used to living with a certain Turian officer.

Garrus hadn’t been joking about taking him in.

There hadn’t been much fuss about him filing the adoption papers, and Iekbon hadn’t really fought against being brought to Garrus’s home. He had been a nice officer to him, so he trusted him to a certain degree. It… had taken him a _long_ time for him to ever consider calling him Dad. And even then, when it had happened initially, it had been an accidental slip of the tongue.

Whenever Iekbon wasn’t training to join C-Sec or being examined by Asari doctors and scientists, he was home with Garrus, learning what foods he liked and didn’t like, learning how to use basic utensils like forks and knives and spoons (you would not believe how long it took for Garrus to get him to stop eating soup and ice cream with his talons, _seriously_ ), and slowly becoming more and more alive.

His favorite food was cookies, by the way.

Iekbon had both sets of amino acids, so he was able to process both kinds of foods. He had the options he could ever want at the tips of his fingers, but damn it, he refused to eat anything but sweets, chips, and meats.

That was it.

Garrus was pretty sure it was _not_ healthy by any means, but Iekbon continued to be in tip top health.

Somehow.

Anyways, as their relationship grew, there were a few things that Garrus had learned about Iekbon. He didn’t like baths, at all. And he loved to sun bathe. _And crawl up into the divet of his suit, wrap himself around his head, and just sleep_.

Most importantly? He was a damn lizard cat. There was no way around it. He was dominantly a lizard with hair on his head and horns sprouting from his skull, but his instincts were definitely that of a fucking cat.

When Iekbon first called Garrus Dad, it had caught both males off guard. It had been when Garrus was helping him shoot a pistol, the young male getting pretty good at using the weapon after having struggled with it for so long. He had to use his Geth eye to aim, but in the end, that was more than alright. It helped, whether he liked it or not. He had gotten his first precision shot and it had startled him greatly, but once he realized what had happened, the widest grin to ever spread across his face appeared. He looked at Garrus with his big, bright green eye, long, red scaled tail wagging happily, exclaiming, “I did it! I got a head shot, Dad!” He immediately clapped his hand over his mouth, his eyes wide in shock at what just slipped out of his mouth.

Garrus looked surprised as well before his mandibles fluttered in joy. “Dad, huh? I think I could get used to that.” He pulled his adopted son into a hug and seemed to grin. “I could definitely get used to it.”

It wasn’t long after that that Iekbon became a member of C-Sec. And a damn good one at that.

At least… Until they got to the Saren case.


End file.
